Warren Murphy - Bottom Line

His secretary was worried. Lippincott had insisted upon being flown into Japan in a private airplane. He had insisted upon being driven to the hotel room from the airport in an American car, driven by an American. And he had literally sneaked into the hotel through a back entrance, first sending the driver up to make sure he would not meet any hotel personnel on the way. Once in his room, Lippincott had given his secretary instructions that he wanted no maids to come into his room.

"But your bed, sir?"

"I'll make my own damn bed," Lippincott had said.

They had left the hotel for the morning meeting the same way. Down a back elevator, into a waiting car with curtains over the windows, and up a back flight of steps to this meeting room.

It occurred to Lippincott's secretary that the American businessman had been in Tokyo nearly twelve hours and had not yet seen a Japanese.

Lippincott paced the delicate patterned rug in the small room like a caged animal. He rubbed his hands together over and over, as if washing them of some infinitesimal speck of dirt.

"I hate this yellow rug," he said. "They got small rugs in this country. Small, yellow rugs. Everything

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small and yellow. You're not getting enough sun, Gerald, you're getting pasty."

The secretary sighed under his breath. Breakdown.

"I'll tell them that you've been taken ill, sir," he said.

Lippineott looked up as if, for the first time, realizing that his secretary was in the room.

He shook his head.

"No, no, that'll never do. Don't you know, boy, we Lippincotts never get ill. Father wouldn't hear of it. We'll go to your freaking meeting. Let's just get it over with fast."

As they walked down the short hallway to the conference room, Lippincott leaned next to his secretary and whispered, "Stay close to me. I may need you."

The secretary nodded, even as he wondered what Lippincott meant.

He stepped ahead of the taller man to open the door to the conference room, then moved aside to let Lippincott go in first.

The fourteen Japanese businessmen, as they saw Lippincott in the doorway, rose to their feet as a sign of respect.

The secretary saw the American recoil a step, as if expecting an assault on his person.

Lippincott froze there a moment and the secretary walked around in front of him into the room.

"Thank you, gentlemen," he said. "Will you please be seated?"

The fourteen men sat down. The secretary turned to Lippincott and smiled at him, as if to reassure him. Lippincott nodded, but came into the room slowly, seemingly searching for land mines.

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He came to the end of the table nearest the door and pulled the chair out. He pulled it four feet from the table, turned it sideways and then sat on the edge of it. It was as if he was expecting to have to make a dash for the door at any moment and this would give him the biggest headstart. The Japanese looked at him with polite curiosity. Manko Kakirano stood up at the table and moved his chair four feet from the table too, then sat down again. The other thirteen businessmen did the same. To get something from their attache cases now, they would have to stand and walk to the table.

The secretary saw beads of sweat appear on the Lippincott forehead. The businessman hissed to him:

"Gerald, you get a chair. Sit between me and them."

Definitely a breakdown, the secretary thought. Unless he was very mistaken, Lern Lippincott would soon be spending some time at the ha-ha house.

The Japanese sat quietly, smiling, until Gerald was seated. He put his chair halfway between Lippincott and the table, but at an angle so he could watch both the Japanese and Lippincott. The American businessman was sweating now like a marathon runner, looking around the room, from yellow face to yellow face. Was he searching for someone? Or something? the secretary wondered.

Lippincott opened his mouth to speak.

Each word seemed to be a labor to produce.

"You gentlemen know why we're here," Lippincott said haltingly, a pause between each word.

There were fourteen nods at the table.

"The President wants the Lippincott companies, through your companies, to open up trade with Red

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China, as a way of increasing trade and helping the dollar. That's what he thinks."

Fourteen more nods.

"I know better," Lippincott said. His speech was speeding up.

"I know you little yellow devils can't be trusted," Lippincott said. "You think I forgot Pearl Harbor?"

The secretary looked in shock at Lippincott and then around the table. There were stunned looks on the Japanese faces, then murmurs of protest.

"Don't argue with me, you heathen midgets," Lippincott said. "I know what you're like. Trying to catch us unawares, trying to do us in. When you and those Chinks get together, the first thing you'll do is try to figure out how you can pick on our flesh." Lippincott's knuckles were white where he gripped the arms of the chair.

Mariko Kakirano rose in his chair. "Mr. Lippincott, I must protest."

Before he could say anything more, Lippincott shrunk back in his chair. "Stay away from me, you. I'm warning you. Stay away from me. No more Ba-taan death marches. Remember Corregidor." He cringed like a child waiting to be struck.

"You have no right," Kakirano said.

The thirteen other businessmen rose to their feet, too. Some of their faces were angry. Most were just startled or confused.

But before Kakirano could say any more, Lem Lippincott jumped to his feet. He put his hands out in front of him, as if warding off invisible blows from the fourteen men standing in front of him.

"No, you don't, you yellow devils. I know what

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you're after, trying to pick my bones, eat my flesh. You won't get away with it."

The secretary rose. Lippincott was waving his arms in front of him, fighting imaginary hordes of

insects.

"Sir," the secretary said, "I think we'd better . . ."

Before he could finish his sentence, one of Lippincott's flailing arms caught him alongside the head and knocked him back into his chair.

"You too, eh? In league with these vultures."

Mariko Kakirano shook his head in disgust. He glanced around, the table. The other men nodded to him. Kakirano took a step toward the door, and the other men moved from their chairs, and lined up behind him in a neat single file.

"Coming after me, eh? You won't get me," Lippincott shouted. He turned away and ran. His left leg knocked against his secretary's chair, spilling it over and dumping the young man onto the carpet. He rolled to a sitting position and looked after Lippincott, just in time to see the businessman dive headfirst through the plate glass window and extend his arms in a swandive toward the street, four stories below.

Lem Lippincott did not go alone. His plunging body crashed into three elderly Japanese as it hit the crowded sidewalk. All four were killed.

The Tokyo police, after careful investigation, called it a tragic accident.

Later that day, the telephone rang in the office of Dr. Elena Gladstone, director of Lifeline Laboratory. The telephone sounded with an electronic beep, instead of the usual ringing bell. Before answering it,

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Dr. Gladstone pressed a button under her desk, which double-locked her office door.

"Yes," she said as she 'picked up the phone, then listened to a voice that explained what had happened to Lem Lippincott.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said.

"I didn't want him dead," the voice said.

"You can't always tell how someone will react," she said. "This is all very experimental."

"Don't let anything like that happen again," the voice said.

"I won't," she promised, as she replaced the receiver, but with the phone hung up and behind the privacy of her locked office door, Dr. Gladstone put back her head and laughed aloud.